Have you heard of Concord Free Press, an innovative nonprofit? Its motto is, "Free their books and their minds will follow."
Concord is pretty serious about that "free" part too, incidentally—at least in the sense that it doesn’t ask readers to pay.
Instead of selling books like Give and Take, its first title, Concord gives them away and asks you to donate to a charity or someone in need. The Press also encourages you to pass the book along to someone else so that the next person will also make a donation, leading to a chain of giving that can go on and on.
How cool is that? Scroll down on Concord’s home page to see a list of customers who have already made donations for G and T. Very inspiring, particularly in this time of economic unrest.
Moderator: Concord is giving away up to 1,500 trade paperbacks of Give and Take, by Stona Fitch, an already-published novelist (photo). He is Concord’s editor and simply wants to jumpstart this laudable effort. Concord won’t publish other books of his.
His "road novel," according to the Concord site, is "about a jazz pianist who steals diamonds and BMWs and gives the money away—which ends up being harder than it sounds. As we say, Give and Take is ‘fast, funny, and felonious.’ It’s also thematically aligned with the concept of giving money away—that’s why it’s our first book. And in a way, the book helped inspire the press." – D.R.
Related: News and reviews about Concord and the novel. Also see PDF of press release.
Stona Fitch also wrote what I think is the scariest novel ever: Senseless.